Better Than Words
by The Phrenologikal Cat
Summary: MCSHEP. There are an infinite number of parallel universes running alongside our own. An infinite number of possibilities, of maybes, of what-ifs. What if you had turned left instead of right? What if you had said yes instead of no?


There are an infinite number of parallel universes running alongside our own. An infinite number of possibilities, of maybes, of what-ifs. What if you had turned left instead of right? What if you had said yes instead of no? What if you had called heads instead of tails?

There's a coin, up in the air, and there's no certainty about what it's going to land on. Heads? Tails? There's a decision, hanging on the outcome of that coin, and you don't know which one to grab onto. Heads? Tails? But it has to come down sometime, and sooner or later you're going to have to choose. Heads? Tails? Here it comes.

Call it.

-

The worst thing about Carson dying was that no one had thought he would. There was a moment of sweet relief because, thank God (if you believed in that sort of thing), he had made it to the bomb squad and everything was going to be okay. Everything would be safe and sound, because, did you hear that? He was safe. The explosive tumour was locked away safely, he said so. Except that he wasn't okay, he wasn't safe, because he was dead.

Ronon and Sheppard were standing outside Carson's room. Inside was Rodney McKay, who had lost the closest thing he had ever had to a friend. Carson Beckett had been a good man who didn't deserve to die, and everyone in Atlantis grieved his death. But McKay wasn't just grieving. He was guilt-wracked, he was lost and broken and seemed beyond consolation. So Sheppard and Ronon stood outside Carson's room, arguing softly with each other. Arguing over who would be better at consoling him.

They flipped a coin. Sheppard called it.

Heads.

It came down tails.

So Ronon went in, and he spoke simple words to McKay, and it did nothing. Words were pointless, because McKay was at a point where words, where sense and reason didn't matter because, oh God, if he had just gone fishing… if he had just… So when Ronon tried to console him by telling him that things like that couldn't be changed it was a pointless effort.

But there's a coin in the air and there's no telling what way it's going to come down. In another world, in another maybe, John Sheppard looked at that coin in the air and he planned to call heads, but instead he called tails. Instead that coin came down tails and he looked at Ronon and told him that it was probably for the best.

Instead Sheppard walked into Carson's room, and in his head he had a speech that told McKay that it wasn't his fault, that no one was blaming him, that everyone was hurting and that was okay. In his head he had a speech that he hoped would make everything All Better, except Rodney McKay turned to him, holding a photo he never knew existed, a photo Carson had kept in his room, in his personal space, of the two of them. Smiling. Laughing. Happy. Friends.

Instead Sheppard saw that photo and saw McKay's face and instead of that speech he had planned out, instead of words, he stepped forward and he wrapped his arms around McKay and let the scientist bury his face in his suit. He let the man break down, even though it hurt him more than anything else he had watched, and instead of words he gave him comfort and touch and security, for a moment, while the man cried in his arms.

-

Sheppard would follow him like a puppy. No, not a puppy. More fierce and protective. Like a guard dog, snapping at any threats and always there, ready to grab on if McKay looked like he was going to fall. Because when Sheppard had held the man, crying in his arms, he realised how this arrogant, selfish scientist was incredibly frail, and he had realised how hurt and scared and guilty and _broken_ he was, and that hurt more than anything. More than physical pain, more than shock, more than the pain of Carson's death. The look of grief and heartbreak on McKay's face as he looked at that photo, which he kept in his own room now, scared Sheppard more even than death.

So he stood by his side, where ever he went, ready and waiting for when he was needed. In the labs, when McKay would be working. Sometimes Rodney would suddenly stop what he was doing and he would look lost for a moment, as if unsure where he was or what he was doing, and his thoughts were returning to that guilty place where he blamed himself entirely for Carson's death. But Sheppard would be there, always. He would lunge forward and his arms would be there to hold McKay, and his breath and his smell and his voice would all be there to comfort and protect him.

Better than words.

Sometimes Sheppard would sleep in his room, on the floor. McKay couldn't sleep, because all he could hear was Carson's final, relieved words playing over and over in his head, and he would imagine the fishing instead of attending a funeral, and his chest would hurt. But then Sheppard, with a preternatural sense, would brush his hand against McKay's, and it wouldn't hurt so much. McKay would get out of his bed and he would lie down on the mattress on the floor, next to Sheppard, and he would think of the body warmth. He would think of Sheppard wrapping an arm around his shoulders and drawing him in close.

Better than words.

Once, when they were having lunch together on one of the countless sea-view balconies, Sheppard made a joke and McKay smiled. Then McKay told a joke and Sheppard laughed, and there didn't need to be words or warmth or even touch after that, because they had found a place where all the pain had gone away. McKay kept smiling and he told Sheppard thank you; for comfort and security and breath and touch and a place where words weren't necessary, and then he kissed Sheppard. Sheppard kissed him back, and it was better than words.

-

There's a coin in the air and an infinite number of possibilities, of maybes, of what ifs. There's an infinite number of chances to take, of lives to be lived, of things to do and avoid doing and hate doing and love doing. There's an infinite number of words and touches and places and feelings and truths and lies and thoughts and sensations and fears and hurts and loves and hates and they're all waiting for the coin to fall.

Heads?

Tails?

Call it.


End file.
